I'm Ross Knight.

A Scottish based open water swimmer and a qualified eCommerce consultant I work with a select group of clients to create eCommerce strategies, implement best practice processes and advise on development.

About Me

I am a vastly experienced eCommerce specialist and started my development life by managing a website design studio in 2000. Further to a successful internal eCommerce project in 2005 I became part developer (primarily .net), part merchant and took over ownership of the business in 2007. Following on from this I grew the eCommerce site to be a leader in its sector and continued my development work which included complex integrations with third party services. Subsequently I provided eCommerce consultancy services for SMEs and in 2012 I co-founded one of UK's leading Magento agencies where I was the CTO for 5 yrs. In this position I managed a development team responsible for Enterprise level solutions. Deciding to resign in April 2017 I now provide consultancy services to a select group merchants where by I assist with developing eCommerce strategies and implementing best practice development processes. My current commitments include the position of CIO at Williamson's My Florist (MyFlorist.co.uk), which is the largest network of flower shops in the UK, and CTO for Gifts Less Ordinary which is a rapidly growing Global Marketplace based in Asia.

Contact Details

Ross Knight mail@rossknight.co.uk

Work

Gifts Less Ordinary (GiftsLessOrdinary.com)

CTO (Chief Technology Officer) •October 2015 - Ongoing

Chief Technology Officer responsible in overseeing the delivery of a scalable marketplace with over 20 store fronts.

Williamsons My Florist (MyFlorist.co.uk)

CIO (Chief Information Officer) •September 2017 - Ongoing

Managing the information technology, strategy and the computer systems required to support the unique objectives and goals of the business.

GetCommerce

Contractor •May 2017 - July 2017

Magento developer and contractor undertaking handover associated to resigning as CTO in April 2017

GetCommerce

Co-Founder, CTO, Technical Director •January 2012 - April 2017

In this position I managed a team of Magento certified developers responsible for Enterprise level solutions whilst being a developer at the same time. I also undertook client management, customer acquisition, strategy and business development and took the lead in instituting best practises in regards development and deployment strategies.

Digital Design Scotland

Manager / Business Owner •January 2000 - January 2012

From originally managing a small team of website developers which provided brochure based websites I transitioned into the business owner and lead developer of an internal eCommerce project which changed the business overnight. I subsequently grew this site to be a leader in its sector. Whilst being a Merchant and developer I undertook a number of complex integrations with third party services.

C&J Knight Ltd

Director •January 2007 - July 2014

I helped lay the foundations for the business in the early 2000's and was made a director in 2007. The business was sold in 2014.

Conferences

eCommerce Show North

Manchester •November 2018 (forthcoming)

Reacticon

Eindhoven •October 2018 (forthcoming)

Meet Magento

Singapore •August 2018

PHP Scotland

Edinburgh •November 2017

Magento Titans

Manchester •November 2017

eCommerce Show North

Manchester •October 2017

Magento Titans

Manchester •November 2016

PHP Scotland

Edinburgh •October 2016

Magento Live

London •June 2016

Meet Magento

Prague •April 2016

Magento Titans Mini

Manchester •February 2016

Magento Titans

Manchester •November 2015

Magento Live

London •June 2015

Magento Titans

Manchester •November 2014

Magento Live

London •July 2014

Education

Magento Qualification

Magento Solution Service Certification •2015

A Magento Solution Specialist is an expert user of the Magento ecommerce platform. Drawing on a deep background in business and ecommerce, the Magento Solution Specialist can efficiently align business objectives with Magento functionality, optimize use of native features, and avoid unnecessary customization. Whether as a merchant, a manager, a consultant, or an analyst, the Magento Solution Specialist knows how to make the best use of Magento technology. A Magento Certified Solution Specialist has deep familiarity with the Magento platform, including: Magento Architecture: layouts, themes, extensions and customizations; Magento data models. Elements of a Magento ecommerce site: catalog, shipping, payment, order processing, promotions, extensions, import/export, etc. Application of Magento knowledge to business goals: mapping client needs to Magento features, recommending the most effective options for implementing client requirements in Magento.

Gray's School Of Art

Bachelor of Arts (B.A.). Field Of Study Design •1999

Established as one of Scotland's five art schools I qualified with a BA Hons in design. Whilst my specialism was "knitting" I had a technical twist to my work in that my patterns (in the main) were produced by programming in a proprietary language.

Skills

Far from exhaustive I have regularly worked with the following technologies in Enterprise level environments (i.e. sites with multi-million turnovers).

CMS SYSTEMS

Magento 1

Magento 2

PHP Grav

WordPress

LANGUAGES / TECHNIQUES

PHP

OOP

MVC

Javascript

jQuery

Prototype

APIs (SOAP, REST, XML)

HTML5

CSS3

SERVER SETUPS

AWS

Linux

Apache

Nginx

Varnish (Reverse Proxies)

MySql

Percona

Split Server Setups

Content Disctribution Networks

MANAGEMENT TOOLS

Atlassian Suite of Products

Scrum Methodologies

Agile Methodologies

Github

BitBucket

DEVELOPMENT TOOLS

GIT

Composer

Vagrant

Docker

SASS

Rocketeer

Capistrano

Grunt

Gulp

Node.js

BOWER

TWIG

LIQUID

Legacy Knowledge

It's been sometime but historically I have a knowledge of the following unclassified languages, tools, platforms etc.

Classic ASP

.NET

VBScript

C#

Microsoft SQL

IIS

Visual Studio

Exchange Server

Drupal

Joomla

Perch

CakePHP

MODX

and more....

Endorsements

Ross has done some excellent work promoting our clients web sites, producing excellent long term results. Ross is always efficient, professional and effective and I would thoroughly recommend his services building and executing a web promotion strategy.

Robin Morris, Director at Bookster & Caravan Sitefinder

Ross kindly agreed to present a workshop at my monthly networking group (East Lothian Coffee Morning) which covered a detailed introduction to the benefits of email marketing. His knowledge was first class and I know from feedback that the presentation was very well received, in fact it was our largest turnout of the year so far.

Al Bryce, Business Growth Advisor at The City of Edinburgh Council

Ross was a conscientious employer, interested in exploring different options and in providing a professional finish. He is an excellent project manager, adept at coaxing a project along and making sure that it came in on time and to budget.

Marianne Hazlewood, Designer / Developer

Contact Form

I welcome enquiries but please note I currently have no current availability.